


Wanting, Not Having

by carolion



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Angst, M/M, Pining, Pre-Slash, Self-Denial, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-25
Updated: 2012-03-25
Packaged: 2017-11-02 12:13:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/368866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carolion/pseuds/carolion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve finds himself wanting something he cannot have.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wanting, Not Having

It’s been a long day. 

The bad guys had seemed faster and meaner, the ground had seemed harder and less forgiving, and Steve felt like every muscle in his body was aching, sore and abused. Still, his team had been triumphant - they were gaining a reputation for being successful - albeit in their usual unconventional ways. Normally Steve would feel smug after another hard-won mission, but on days like this, he can do nothing but bow to the bone-deep weariness that has set in.

The shower had sluiced off most of the blood and dirt and sweat from his body, but it did nothing to alleviate the unsettling exhaustion or cure the way his back is twinging from a miscalculated tackle earlier that day. Not for the first time, Steve wonders what the hell he’s going to do when he can’t do _this_ any more, when he gets too old, too broken, too - useless. But just thinking about it sends flocks of panicked birds fluttering around in his stomach, enough to make him ill so he turns his thoughts away from the future and heads downstairs for a beer to clear his mind.

He doesn’t make it to the kitchen though, not before finding that Danny’s is still splayed out on the couch, mouth half-open and eyes closed. One hand is curled in a loose fist on his chest, and the other is dangling off the couch, his fingertips skimming the floor. Steve can feel his whole mind shudder, click, and disengage, shifting into a completely different hemisphere, the one that Danny always lulls him into. He drifts closer without really thinking, sighing a little as he inspects Danny’s shadowed face. There’s uneven stubble on his chin and cheeks, and Steve swears he can see the glint of silver in his slicked back hair. 

It’s not the first night that Danny has crashed on his couch, accidentally or otherwise. And it’s not the first time that Steve has felt himself swaying, on the edge of _doing something_ , almost tasting the winds of change as they rush by. Steve has never had a heart so full since Danny bulldozed into his life, and changed every rule Steve had. There aren’t even words to express what Steve feels, because it’s a lifetime’s worth of running and fighting and holding and saving and trusting and learning and loving, all crammed into a few years. 

Steve kneels so he can gently cradle Danny’s dangling hand and cautiously places it back on the couch, so he won’t wake up with numb fingers and a sleeping arm. 

As he goes to stand, he glances down at Danny one more time, and there’s a rush of longing so heady it makes him dizzy. He _wants_ , he wants more than he can stand, more than he’s ever dreamed he could want, but he already knows he cannot have it. Steve’s whole life has been a series of wants and can not haves, and this is just one more in the sequence, the most unfair of them all. Because despite how he tells himself to stop, to shut it off, to let it go, it persists, an ache deep in his chest, a million bursts of light erupting every time Danny smiles at him, blinding him. 

And sometimes, times like now, when he’s trapped in a moment and can almost grasp the courage, he nearly convinces himself that he _can_ have what he wants - and it’s Danny, it’s always Danny, Danny’s eyes and Danny’s hair, and Danny’s smile and Danny’s love. Steve doesn’t even realize he’s reaching out, one hand braced on the arm of his couch above Danny’s head, the other skimming the collar of Danny’s ridiculous button down shirt. 

_Don’t I deserve this?_ he wonders to himself, lulled into security by the darkness of night, and the serenity of his sleeping partner.

His hand cups the side of Danny’s face, fingers sinking into his hair, and Steve bends to press his lips against Danny’s forehead, pausing the moment his mouth meets Danny’s skin, determined to enjoy the closeness and trying to suspend the inevitable - when he must push away. It’s intimate enough that Steve is suddenly spooked by his own courage, his languid calm broken by his suddenly racing heart and sweating palms. He pulls away as slowly as he can, swallowing as he watches Danny for any reaction, any sign he might be awake or angry. But there is none. His eyelids flutter with some dreamer’s adventure, and nothing has changed at all for him.

Steve can love Danny in the quiet moments, when all is still. He knows it only makes it harder in the cold light of morning, when nothing has changed but his heart still races, but the feeling he has - coming so close to _having_ after so much wanting - is well worth the ache in his heart the next day.


End file.
